Ten Flavors of Music
by Nagia
Summary: Ten Yuffie-centric drabbles. Music fic meme.


**Ten Flavors of Music  
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01. Faith and the Muse - The Unquiet Grave

The sky is dark, the fires bright against the blackness. Somewhere, the Leviathan is roaring down to the sea, but all the child sees or hears is the heavy thundering of the taiko drums and the dancing of the grown-ups around her. Long blue sleeves flutter in the wind, gold-bedecked feet stamp out a rhythm in the dust. Somewhere, someone keens, long and high and loud.

There's something so beautiful about her people. There's something so lovely and perfect about the worship of their god and Yuffie watches and mimics the steps of her mother. Already she knows she will hold this in her heart, hold this and keep this, because this is the core of her people. This love, these beliefs, it is the core of Wutai. She will remember this; even when they forget it, she will remember this.

* * *

02. Hitoshi Sakimoto - An Attic of the Great Cathedral

The Materia in her hands glinted ruby red, but she could see flecks of blue, of silver and green. Dancing under her eyelids, pushing and pulling, ebbing and flowing, sinuous and scaled and feathered and bejewelled.

Her hands were warm, her body was warm. She could feel the tide of her blood in her veins.

What would happen if she summoned him?

He would answer. She knew that much. SHe could feel it in her stomach, in her spine.

Were the scales hers or his, she wondered as the materia slipped into her armor.

* * *

03. See-Saw - Silent Life

In the dream, her mother is calling something. There are bells ringing, the coins tied around her mothers wrists and ankles jingling. She tries to reply, tries to join the call-and-refrain song of rain blessings.

In the dream, she is not tiny and sticky and chubby-fisted. She is lithe and slender, taller than she should be. Secure.

In the dream, she can clap and motion, she can dance. She remembers the ritual words. She can even pronounce them.

Her mother smiles and for a few perfect instants, in the dream, there was never any fire, never any war. No sword sliding into her mother's stomach, no bloodied hands scrabbling at the wooden floors.

Yuffie wakes smiling. Tifa and Aerith are already awake and she watches them and says nothing, curled onto her side, silent and at peace for the first time in years. They are laughing. She admires the way Aerith's fingers curl to cover her mouth as she giggles. There is beauty in their pale skin, in their maturity.

* * *

04. See-Saw - Key of the Twilight

"Come with me in the twilight of a summer night for a while." It's a lyric drifting from the radio that Tifa has left in the window and Yuffie finds her feet tapping to the rhythm, finds herself humming along even though she doesn't know the words.

It's a song she wishes Vincent could hear and that burns, so she smiles at Marlene and stamps her feet and sways as they wash and dry the dishes. She thinks about Cloud and Tifa, who are still in the dining room, and wonders if either of them knows how to dance. It'd be fun to see if she could MAKE them dance; she still carries a Manipulate everywhere she goes.

Marlene laughs when she voices this thought and says that Tifa would never do something as silly as dance with Cloud.

Come with me in the twilight of a summer night for a while, Yuffie hums and thinks about all of AVALANCHE, wonders who wrote this song and why. She strums her air guitar and smiles for Marlene, throwing her head back and wailing with the singer.

The laughter feels good.

* * *

05. Hitoshi Sakimoto - Snowfly Forest

There are people tramping through her forest. She flits through the trees, clinging to limbs that she shouldn't be able to hold onto, only not barefoot by the grace of Leviathan.

Who are they? She catelogues them and tries to determine her angle of attack. It's such a large party. More than three combatants. Probably a bad idea, right?

It actually was a bad idea, she thinks after a hail of gunshots and too many volleys of punches and too many aching, knife-edged dodges of that giant sword. She crouches in the dust and glares up at them, face dirty and hair greasy.

She smirks as she suddenly springs up, out of the grass, and manages to snag their gil.

And then it's back to the forest, jumping amongst the treees, trying to put as much distance between herself and them as possible. She wishes she had their Materia.

* * *

06. See-Saw - Strangers

Yuffie stands in the centre of Nibelheim, by the ancient fountain, and watches the world pass her by. It's funny. This place always seemed so sleepy, but today it's brisk and it ignores her, doesn't care about her.

The Manor is calling her. Its gates are flung wide open and it has actual grass, now, except in the shade of the thriving oaks.

Has it really been three years?

She stares at the doors to the mansion and realizes that the windows been re-paned, that the doors are painted.

It seems so impossible that he could have returned to the coffin.

She hopes he hasn't.

* * *

07. Barenaked Ladies - Grim Grinning Ghosts

Yuffie laughs and claps playfully as she and Reeve dance. He's actually pretty good at swing, and that's part of what surprises her.

He pulls her close and they sway, moving into the Lindie. He's pushing her around on the dance floor, their hips rocking in time to the beat and she throws back her head and laughs. When Reeve arches an eyebrow and nods in Vincent's direction, she laughs harder, nearly collapses onto his chest at the mere thought.

Vincent doesn't even notice their attention as Reeve pushes her into a dip and the song ends.

* * *

08. Hennessey - Cosmonaut

Cloud is sitting in the garden in Aerith's church. Yuffie says nothing, doesn't even greet him when the doors thump closed and his head jerks up.

"What are you doing here, Cloud?" She asks, voice achingly tired.

He has a chance at life and he's throwing it away. She wants to pound her fists against his chest and scream.

He doesn't answer her.

She sits down beside him and viciously plucks a flower, jerking the stem in half. She wags the flower in his face and glares, saying nothing. There doesn't seem to be anything to say.

It's what Aerith would do, she knows. Smack him in the face with alily or a daffodil or whatever the fuck it is as she made her point.

* * *

09. The Night Before Christmas - This Is Halloween

"But I'm scared!" Marlene wailed, clinging to Vincent's leg.

Yuffie fought not to laugh until she cried. Vincent's discomfort was obvious and gratifying.

She bent at her knees, looking at the Shinra Mansion-turned-Haunted-House. "C'mon, kiddo. None of it's real. You know that."

The wind blew the long dark locks of her wig around, into her mouth. Marlene didn't look impressed with her windblown appearance or the fanged smile she flashed.

"I said this was a bad idea," Vincent murmured, and gasped when Marlene punched him in the knee.

"Nobody likes an I told you so!" Marlene mumbled.

Yuffie laughed and ruffled her hair. "Just give it one more chance, okay?"

* * *

10. See-Saw - Aura

Tifa's arms wrapped around her, her arms wrapped around Tifa, and they cried together. Tifa's warmth in her arms was comforting. She squeezed her eyes shut, then opened them, closing them again at the bright, blinding slant of sunlight. One of Tifa's hands slid through her hair and Yuffie wailed, pulling her close.

Somewhere behind them, Aerith was beginning her slow, steady journey beneath the waters of the Ancient's City.

They rocked each other. This couldn't be happening. This couldn't be happening. Right? There was a gaping, aching awful hole in her at the very thought and she knew Tifa was feeling the same. Nobody was okay.

Nothing was okay.

Nothing would ever be okay again.


End file.
